In Louisiana, adverse possession is called acquisitive prescription, and it lets someone who openly occupies land as if they owned it become the legal owner after either 10 or 30 years, depending on whether they hold a defective deed and acted in good faith. The rules come from the Louisiana Civil Code, not the common law used in most other states, and the differences matter.
What Counts as Possession
Every claim starts with actual, physical use of the land combined with the intent to hold it as owner. Civil Code Article 3424 requires both: you have to mean to possess as owner, and you have to take corporeal possession.1LSU Law. Louisiana Civil Code Article 3424 Cutting the grass now and then does not do it. Fencing, farming, building on the land, or living there does.
The possession also has to be:
- Continuous and uninterrupted. The clock runs only while the use is steady.
- Open and notorious. A reasonable owner watching the property would see it.
- Unequivocal. Behavior that could just as well be a tenant’s or a guest’s is not enough.2Justia. Louisiana Civil Code Article 3436 – Equivocal Possession
- Hostile. You are using the land without the owner’s permission. Hostile here does not mean aggressive; it means you are not there as anyone’s guest or tenant.
Miss any one of these elements at any point in the required period and the claim fails.
The Ten-Year Path: Just Title and Good Faith
The shorter route requires four things together under Article 3475: 10 years of qualifying possession, good faith, just title, and property that can legally be prescribed.3Louisiana State Legislature. Louisiana Civil Code 3475 – Requisites
A “just title” is a transaction that would normally transfer ownership, such as a sale, exchange, or donation, but that has some defect.4Justia. Louisiana Civil Code Article 3483 – Just Title The classic example: you buy land and get a deed, and only later does it come out that the seller did not actually own the property. The deed looked legitimate, you believed the sale was valid, and that is enough on this element.
Good faith under Article 3480 is measured objectively. It is not just whether you personally believed you owned the land, but whether that belief was reasonable given what you knew or should have known.5Louisiana State Legislature. Louisiana Civil Code 3480 – Good Faith Buying at a suspiciously low price from a stranger who cannot explain how they got the property is the kind of fact that sinks a good-faith claim.
When just title and good faith are both present, 10 years of continuous, open, hostile possession completes ownership. And because the deed’s description defines the scope, a possessor who physically occupied part of the tract can claim the whole thing described in the title.
The Thirty-Year Path: No Deed Needed
Without just title or good faith, ownership can still transfer, but only after 30 years. Article 3486 says immovable property can be acquired by 30-year prescription “without the need of just title or possession in good faith.”6Justia. Louisiana Civil Code Article 3486 – Immovables Prescription of Thirty Years This is the path for someone who never had a deed but has openly used the land for three decades.
There is a real trade-off. Under the 30-year rule, the claim is limited to what was actually possessed. Article 3487 caps the claim at the ground you physically used, so a deed’s boundaries cannot stretch it. Fence and farm two acres of a ten-acre tract, and only those two acres transfer. The other rules of acquisitive prescription still apply where compatible: continuous, open, hostile, and unequivocal possession.7LSU Law. Louisiana Civil Code Articles 3486 Through 3488
Tacking: Adding a Prior Possessor’s Time
You do not always have to be the one who occupied the land for the whole period. Louisiana allows tacking, meaning a current possessor can add a prior possessor’s time to their own if the property was transferred between them and possession was never interrupted.8Justia. Louisiana Civil Code Article 3442 – Tacking of Possession
If a parent openly held the land for 7 years and then passed it to you with no gap, 3 more years of continuous possession finishes a 10-year claim (assuming just title and good faith). If the land sat empty for a year in between, tacking is off the table and your clock starts fresh.
What Stops the Clock
Two kinds of events reset or halt the prescriptive period, and both matter to owners and possessors alike.
Natural Interruption
Natural interruption happens when the possessor loses possession, either because someone else takes over or because the possessor abandons the land. Louisiana gives a one-year grace period: recovering possession within a year, or filing suit to recover it within a year, is treated as if the interruption never happened.9Justia. Louisiana Civil Code Article 3465 – Interruption of Acquisitive Prescription After a year with no recovery and no suit, all accumulated time is lost.
Civil Interruption
Civil interruption happens the moment the true owner files a lawsuit against the possessor in a court of proper jurisdiction. The prescriptive period stops running that day.10Louisiana State Legislature. Louisiana Civil Code 3462 – Interruption of Prescription Filing in the wrong court still interrupts prescription as to a defendant actually served within the prescriptive period, but the correct court is safer. For an owner who suspects someone is running the clock, this is the strongest tool available.
Land That Cannot Be Taken This Way
Public property, including roads, waterways, government buildings, and other land owned by the state or its political subdivisions for public use, is generally outside acquisitive prescription. No amount of time occupying a public park or a state-owned lot will make it yours.
On the flip side, Article 3467 provides that prescription runs against all persons unless a specific law creates an exception.11Justia. Louisiana Civil Code Article 3467 – Persons Against Whom Prescription Runs Minors, people under guardianship, and absent owners are not automatically shielded; the clock runs against them too unless a separate statute suspends it.
Defenses for the True Owner
If someone is claiming your land, the strongest defenses attack the required elements directly.
Show You Gave Permission
Permission destroys the hostile element. A lease, a signed letter, or credible testimony about an oral arrangement proves the occupant was there as a guest or tenant, not as an owner. No length of time cures that.
Show a Gap in Possession
Prove the possessor abandoned or lost the land for more than a year at any point in the period, and the accumulated time resets.9Justia. Louisiana Civil Code Article 3465 – Interruption of Acquisitive Prescription Satellite imagery, utility records, and neighbor testimony can all establish stretches of non-use. This defense hits hardest against 30-year claims, where keeping unbroken possession for that long is harder to sustain and harder to document.
Attack Good Faith or Just Title
Against a 10-year claim, you can attack either good faith or just title. If the possessor knew or should have known the deed was defective, or if the document they lean on is not a valid juridical act like a sale or donation, the 10-year route closes.4Justia. Louisiana Civil Code Article 3483 – Just Title They then have to satisfy the 30-year standard, which may be out of reach.
File Suit
Filing a lawsuit in a competent court immediately halts prescription.10Louisiana State Legislature. Louisiana Civil Code 3462 – Interruption of Prescription If the prescriptive period runs out first, the claim has already matured and recovery becomes much harder. Owners who suspect a problem should get an attorney involved early.
Getting the Judgment: The Petitory Action
Ownership through prescription is not automatic. The possessor has to go to court and get a judgment, and in Louisiana the vehicle is the petitory action, a lawsuit to determine ownership of immovable property.12Justia. Louisiana Code of Civil Procedure 3651 – Petitory Action
The burden falls on the person claiming ownership. Under Code of Civil Procedure Article 3653, if the defendant is in possession, the plaintiff must prove ownership either from a previous owner or through acquisitive prescription. If the defendant is not in possession, the plaintiff need only show better title than the defendant.13FindLaw. Louisiana Code of Civil Procedure Article 3653 For a prescription claimant, that means enough evidence, survey maps, tax records, photographs of improvements, and testimony from neighbors, to prove every element for the entire statutory period. Once the court issues the judgment, recording it with the parish Clerk of Court cleans up the chain of title.